Wednesday, 4 December - In pink, goes with everything

Good morning, it’s Wednesday, 4 December. In your Squiz Today…

  • A break in the Easey Street murder case

  • Political turmoil in South Korea

  • And a fishy fashion mystery… 🐟

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Squiz the Weather

Squiz Sayings

“It's a kick in the guts to your customers.”

Said Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones after CommBank announced some of its customers would be charged $3 for withdrawing their own cash. The bank’s ATMs are still free, but if you use a teller, or the post office, you might get slugged from 6 January next year.

A long search for answers

The Squiz

The prime suspect in Melbourne’s historic Easey Street murders touched down in Australia last night, nearly 48 years after Suzanne Armstrong and Susan Bartlett were found dead in their home. Perry Kouroumblis, a 65yo Australian-Greek dual national, was arrested in Italy in September and agreed to be extradited to Melbourne. This week, he was transferred into the custody of Victorian Police, who brought him back for formal questioning.

Remind me what happened…

Armstrong (27yo) and Bartlett (28yo) were old school friends renting a terrace cottage together on the now-infamous Easey Street in the Melbourne suburb of Collingwood. What we know is that, in January 1977, 3 days after the friends were last seen alive, neighbours raised the alarm after hearing Armstrong’s 16mo son crying inside the house. Police were sent to do a welfare check and found the bodies of Armstrong, who had been sexually assaulted, and Bartlett. They had each been stabbed more than a dozen times, but the toddler was found unharmed in his cot. “Vicious” and “brutal” have been used to describe the murders over the years, and more recently, Victoria Police Commissioner Shane Patton called the “absolutely gruesome, horrific, frenzied homicide” the state’s “most serious cold case”.

So what led to this breakthrough?

Kouroumblis, who lived close to the victims at the time, has been on detectives’ radars since a week after the murders - when he told them he’d found a bloodied knife near Easey Street. He left Australia about 7 years ago, around the time police issued an Interpol Red Notice (aka an international arrest warrant) - and was arrested after landing at Italy’s Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport in September. No charges have been laid, and he’s denied having anything to do with the murders. His lawyer, Serena Tucci, says he wants to “come back to Australia and explain everything” - something he’ll have the chance to do when he’s interviewed… In the meantime, the families of Armstrong and Bartlett have thanked investigators, saying their “perseverance and dedication” over the decades “is something to truly behold”.

Getting up to speed about consent

Consent is key to healthy, respectful sexual experiences and relationships, and that’s why it's so important for us as a community - particularly our young people - to talk more about it. We get it… The conversations might feel awkward or uncomfortable at the start, but adults play a big part in helping the young people in our lives to understand. It's all about communication - and the more we know, the more we can share with others. If you want some tips on how to talk about consent, this is a good place to get started with conversation guides and other resources.

Squiz the Rest

Political turmoil in South Korea 

Protests have broken out in South Korea after President Yoon Suk Yeol declared martial law - the first time it’s been invoked in the country in over 50 years. Yoon announced the move in a surprise late-night TV address, triggering large protests and an emergency countervote by MPs. The President said he was making the directive - which bans political activities and hands control of the country including the media to the military - to "crush anti-state forces that have been wreaking havoc". Troops were then deployed to Parliament and military helicopters were seen landing on the roof. Opposition leader Lee Jae-myung then called on his peers and ordinary people to protest - and hundreds did. The ruling was voted down at around 1.00am local time and declared invalid, but Yoon is yet to officially lift it.

A step closer to a Bali Nine deal

Indonesia has given Australia a draft proposal for the transfer home of the remaining 5 Bali Nine prisoners, which it wants to see happen asap. Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke is in Indonesia this week, where talks have continued about the prisoner exchange deal. The group is serving life sentences over a 2005 drug smuggling operation, but there are no existing laws in either country to allow for the transfer of prisoners, so officials are working through the fine print. There were also questions over whether the prisoners would have to serve the rest of their sentence back at home, but Indonesia's Law Minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra yesterday said that would be up to Australia. “If the countries want to give amnesty, we respect it. It’s their right”, he said - adding that he hoped “we can finalise this matter … this December”. Stay tuned…

Practising safe texts

New rules announced by the Albanese Government yesterday mean telcos must block texts from anyone who isn’t on a to-be-created sender ID register. Scamwatch says Aussies have lost $11 million to text message scams - like dodgy operators pretending to be the ATO or one of the big banks - so far this year. Once the register is established in late 2025, if a sender isn’t registered, the message will either get blocked - or the text will come with a warning. Legislation for the register was introduced into Parliament in June, but it was only yesterday Communications Minister Michelle Rowland confirmed it would be mandatory after a voluntary trial earlier in the year. It’ll cost $10 million over 4 years, and a similar measure in Singapore resulted in a 64% dropoff in scam texts. C u l8r, scammers…

Vale Neale Fraser

The Aussie tennis legend has died at 91yo. Born in Melbourne, Fraser won 19 Grand Slam titles - 3 as a singles star - and twice beat none other than Rocket Rod Laver in a final in 1960 to win Wimbledon and the US championship. But it was the Davis Cup that he might be best remembered for - winning the team tournament 4 times between 1959-62, and winning it another 4 times as a non-playing captain over a 24-year span. He was a former World #1, a member of the International Tennis Hall of Fame, and helped inspire the careers of some of our other men’s tennis greats, like John Fitzgerald and Pat Cash. If you’d like to learn more about Fraser, here’s a video of the man himself reflecting on some of the memorable photos of his life in tennis. 

It’s called fashion sweetie, look it up

Okay, stay with us on this one - scientists have spotted orcas in the US wearing salmon as a hat. Some Washington State whales have been spotted swimming around with dead salmon resting on their noggin - and no one really knows why. It could be to impress their pod pals - no, really - or maybe it’s just a convenient place to keep a snack. It could be because they just like perfuming themselves in Eau de Poisson Mort. The strange thing is, this is not the first time the phenomenon has come up. Some fashion-forward Free Willies’ first forays into fish fedoras happened in 1987, when a female orca was spotted with salmon on her head for a full year, a style soon adopted by her podmates. The salmon hats had vanished by 1988, but unlike some other eighties trends, they’ve made quite the comeback…

Apropos of Nothing

An annual highlight during December is the White House getting all fancied up for Christmas - you can check out some of the photos here and here. With Melania Trump returning to the building next year, we might see more of those famous red trees

Margot Robbie says she was worried she was going to be arrested for slapping Leonardo DiCaprio’s moneymaker during her audition for The Wolf of Wall Street, instead of kissing it. Probably not recommended for most job interviews, but it worked out well for Margot…

Speaking of Robbie, her version of Barbie might have enjoyed parking Jaguar’s new electric vehicle in the Dreamhouse garage - after a controversial rebrand, the new look was wheeled out yesterday at an official unveiling in Miami - one thing’s for sure, it’s very, very pink…

Squiz the Day

9.00am (AEDT) - NSW Premier Chris Minns will open the NSW Drug Summit’s 2-day Sydney forum

12.30pm (AEDT) - Disability Advocate Hannah Diviney in partnership with Women in Media will address the National Press Club on "Wheels In Motion: Inside A Storyteller's Brain" - Canberra

10.00am (AWST) - The inquest into the death of Indigenous teenager Cleveland Dodd resumes (until 12 December) - Perth

12.30pm (AEDT) - Public hearings continue into the use of AI in the public sector with representatives from the National Archives, the Human Rights Commission, and the Public Sector Union to appear - Canberra

6.15pm (AEDT) - AIS Sports Performance Awards - Melbourne

8.00pm (AEDT) - Women’s Soccer: The Matildas take on Taiwan in the first of 2 friendlies - Melbourne

🎅 Santa's List Day

Birthdays for Jeff Bridges (1949), Jay Z (1969) and Tyra Banks (1973)

Anniversary of:

  • Elizabeth Taylor’s 7th marriage, this time to politician John Warner (1976)

  • the disbanding of Led Zeppelin, 2 months after the death of drummer John Bonham (1980)

  • the death of Australian Labor MP Peta Murphy (2023)

  • Brenda Lee's festive classic Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree hitting the top spot on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart a whopping 65 years after it first jingled its way into our hearts (2023)